


The Space Between the Things You Know

by daisyridlay



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: (sort of), Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Space, Angst, CHAPTERS ARE SHORT BUT FOR A REASON, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Codependency, Depression, Identity Issues, Isolation, M/M, Memory Loss, Mental Health Issues, Outer Space, Passengers AU, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Drama, Suicidal Thoughts, Timeline What Timeline, Unhealthy Relationships, bucky's got a whole subscription, everything after CATWS is basically dead to me at this point, everything after CATWS is just a blur, it gets better though, lots of issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-04
Updated: 2019-11-01
Packaged: 2020-11-23 07:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 9,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20888210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisyridlay/pseuds/daisyridlay
Summary: There is a spaceship built by Stark Industries that is on a 120-year journey to a new planet. Aboard this ship are over 5,000 passengers and crew members, each contained in cryostasis pods that will keep them frozen in time until they arrive at their destination.Thirty years pass after the initial launch of STARK VIII into space.James Barnes wakes up.(The Passengers AU that won't leave me alone after all these years.)





	1. PROLOGUE.

**Author's Note:**

> watching the movie ‘passengers’ was a wild ride, mostly because i thought that the movie was horrible but the concept was fascinating. this is what i decided to do with it.
> 
> chapter title is from the song ['beside you' by marianas trench.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ0z1LH6RJc)
> 
> FUN FACT: i first started writing this in december 2016. oops is an understatement. but hey third year's the charm, right?
> 
> FUN(NER) FUN FACT: working title for this story was "bucky suffers, but in space" because i'm terrible like that.
> 
> * * *
> 
> dedicated to anyone who still had me on user subscriptions in the hopes that i would one day write another stucky fic. this one's for all of you guys oof

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ship's engines burn brightly amongst the stars as they propel the spacecraft across the vast emptiness of the galaxy, funnelling five thousand hopes and dreams from Earth to beyond the Milky Way.

_“Right. Cause you got nothing to prove. Don't do anything stupid until I get back.” _

_ “How can I? You're taking all the stupid with you.” _

* * *

There is a spaceship built by Stark Industries that is on a 120-year journey to a new planet. Aboard this ship are over 5,000 passengers and crew members, each contained in cryostasis pods that will keep them frozen in time until they arrive at their destination.

The ship's engines burn brightly amongst the stars as they propel the spacecraft across the vast emptiness of the galaxy, funnelling five thousand hopes and dreams from Earth to beyond the Milky Way. The sleeping city within the spaceship is unaware of the beauty outside the artificial walls it is encased in. Artists and scientists and engineers await their destination, where they will experience the new challenges and opportunities of settling in an unknown, untouched place.

A spaceship travels through the galaxy. A new civilization is on its way to a new home.

* * *

Thirty years pass after the initial launch of STARK VIII into space.

James Barnes wakes up.

* * *

His vision is full of soft blurry shapes and colours. For a moment, he thinks he can hear warm laughter. Dim light dances across his shuttering eyelids as he inhales deeply, feeling the warm burn of oxygen in his lungs. The sensation sits oddly in his body. He sits up and blinks slowly at the display that has suddenly appeared before him.

“Welcome, James Barnes. How are you feeling? Do not be alarmed. I am JARVIS, an AI system designed to assist you with your removal from cryostasis.” There is the Stark Industries logo on the screen, the 3D symbol rotating relentlessly in the bottom right corner. The face of the AI that is shown on the monitor is of a plain and unremarkable man.

The AI continues, “You are a passenger in space on the STARK VIII, the latest premium model in expedited space travel. You have nearly completed your 120-year journey to your new home planet, the Anthony VIII. A fresh start full of adventure and new world wonders.” The screen shifts momentarily to bright images of greenery and natural landmarks that swim across his vision like fish. “How are you feeling?”

It is only after a moment that James Barnes realizes the AI is waiting for a response.

His mouth is full of cotton. He has to work his tongue and his jaw for a few moments before they unstick.

“Cryostasis,” he repeats dumbly.

“Affirmative. Please be advised that it is perfectly normal to experience discomfort, disorientation, and distorted cognitive function upon awakening. Other possible symptoms include short-term memory loss, temporary loss of vision, and mild bouts of nausea. You should expect to operate below normal functioning levels for a few days as your body readjusts.”

“Fucking ace,” he mutters, rolling his shoulders as he swings his still-stiff legs over the side of the pod. “Right. Well, what's next?” He rubs at his eyelids with a free hand as he pushes himself to his feet. The digital display on the side of the pod lists his name and rank: Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes.

“You will proceed to your assigned room, and further instructions will be given in the morning.” A room and sector number are flashing on the screen. “Please follow the directions on-screen to proceed.”

“Great. Guess I could use a little more shut-eye, huh.” He stumbles his way over to the doors, which slide open for him. The AI, JARVIS, guides him to a small room with a bunk and some basic necessities. He barely has the energy to wash up before he strips down to his boxers and curls up on the bed, letting the exhaustion wash over him. Pulling the blanket and sheets up, he closes his eyes for the first time in god knows how many years.

His dreams are strange and colourful, full of golden hues and azure-blue skies. He does not remember them in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> each chapter will be one day long. as such, they will be varying lengths. there will be time skips, meaning there are gaps in between chapters as the story jumps along. so this first chapter is a short one, but isn't an example of how long you should expect all chapters to be.
> 
> hope you are all as excited for this as i am! please leave comments below :)


	2. DAY ONE.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “JARVIS,” he asks, a terrible notion occurring to him. “How long till we reach the destination?”

When morning arrives, he feels like shit. It takes a full fifteen minutes to work up the strength to get out of the bed, and even then he has to sit still for another five, just to stop the dizziness that washes over him. The only silver lining is that he hasn't thrown up. Yet.

He gets dressed slowly. The AI directs him to a large theatre room.

He then asks JARVIS for directions to the mess hall. The mess hall is empty. The record hall, the viewing lounge, the restrooms, the theatres— all empty. He wanders around aimlessly, shouting each time he discovers a new area. There are no responses. He drags himself down to the ship’s center, which of course is also devoid of human beings.

“JARVIS,” he asks. “Where is everybody?”

“The passengers or the crew?”

“The passengers,” he clarifies.

“The passengers of STARK VIII are currently located on pod decks one through seven.”

The passengers of the ship were still on the pod deck. The passengers were still. Still in the pods? “What.”

“The passengers of—”

“No. Fuck. I heard that. Are the passengers in the pods? Where are the crew members?” His head is swimming, and it's hard to try and think logically.

“The passengers of STARK VIII are scheduled to remain in their pods until four months before landing. The crew members of STARK VIII are located in the ship's control room.”

He breathes a sigh of relief. The crew would know what was going on. “Okay, great. Where's that?”

JARVIS directs him to the control room. He wanders down the hall until he reaches the door, where he scans his ID card. The door starts to open, revealing another door behind it. He scans his card again, but the door remains firmly closed.

“Hey, come on.” He waves the card across the sensor, and the scanner flashes red in response.

“Only authorized personnel are allowed in the control room,” JARVIS informs helpfully.

“Fuck you,” he mutters angrily, smacking a hand against the wall. There is a glass window on the door, however. He can press his face against it and peer inside.

The control room is dark. At first glance, there is no one inside. But there are soft lights illuminating the floor, and it is then that he is able to focus in on the cryostasis pods that lay in neat rows against the walls. The pods that still contain living, breathing, _ frozen _ human beings inside them.

His heart seizes almost painfully in his chest. The pods, his brain repeats in an endless loop of terror, the pods the pods the pods. The floor is unsteady beneath his feet as he hears himself ask JARVIS to direct him back to his pod deck.

The pod decks are divided further into separate rooms, each labelled by letter. Further inspection finds that all the rooms on his deck are still full of people-filled pods. His head is killing him at this point, but he has to know, he has to be _ sure_.

His pod is the only one open. The display on the side has no vital signs, just his name and rank. There are no signs of foul play that he can make out, but what the hell does he know? He's not a scientist. He's a soldier.

His legs are giving out on him. He slumps hard against the side of the pod, burying his aching head in his hands. What the hell was going on. What was he supposed to do. His headache throbs as he clutches at his hair, a low, pained noise emerging from his throat. He can't think. He can't. He feels nauseous and sweaty, and all the running around the ship he'd done hadn't helped.

He'll close his eyes, just for a moment. Get his bearings before he has to deal with the current shitstorm he's in. There are still gaps in his short-term memory that are being filled in.

He remembers what he packed, but he doesn't remember going into cryo. He remembers putting on the clothes he woke up in, but not when he finalized his decision to go on this trip. He'd been on the fence about this choice for a long time, but he can't remember why he had been indecisive either.

Surely moving to a new planet wasn't something he would be going back and forth on. It seemed like a pretty solid yes-or-no thing.

The metal of the pod is a cool balm against his back. He loses track of the minutes as he sits there, sorting through the jumble in his head. His stomach growls at him, impatient. He'd left the empty mess hall this morning before he had eaten anything.

“Alright,” he says aloud. “Food first.”

Using his pod to support himself, he stands. The pod looks fine, and for a moment he considers dropping himself right back in and closing the hatch. But no. He'd have to find some more information before he went and shut himself back inside. Who knew what the hell would happen if he tried to do that.

He still wasn't thinking clearly, he was aware enough of that fact, so maybe he'd wait a few days until he felt better. And in the meantime he could get more information from the AI, because obviously something had gone wrong with his pod. The other possibility, the scenario where something had gone wrong with all of the other pods, made even less sense.

“JARVIS,” he asks, a terrible notion occurring to him. “How long till we reach the destination?”

“Estimated arrival at current speeds is in ninety years, three weeks, two days and seven hours.”

It wasn't just that his pod had been the only one to open. His had been the only one to open _ early_. The realization makes his head spin all over again. He has to blink to clear the blurry spots in his vision. He braces his hands on the pod next to his, and his fingers are trembling and twitching on the glass.

Inside this cryochamber lies another passenger. The glass is slightly frosted, but some of the features of the man within are still visible. Blond hair, strong jawline. Looking peaceful in sleep. Motionless, like a statue frozen in time.

Pacing his breaths to stall the nausea, he makes his way over to the other side to read the display. The letters appear to vibrate on the screen before his vision focuses.

Captain Steven Grant Rogers. An officer, then, not a soldier.

His stomach protests again, rather loudly. “Okay, okay. Food.” He jerks away from the Captain and ambles back to the mess hall.

* * *

The white walls and tables of the cafeteria that greet him are off putting. It's too clean, too sterile, even for an eating area. Everything here is so minimal and polished that it makes him feel uneasy. There is a huge array of empty tables and chairs, all composed of the same white plastic and shiny silver metal. He wanders past them, dragging his fingertips along the backs of the chairs.

There is a module in the middle of the seating area that displays the food and drink options. Scanning his ID, he orders a coffee and some buttered toast. He's not sure how much he'll be able to keep down, so there’s no use in wasting anything. The machine chirps happily and charges his account some overpriced amount before spitting out his order. The coffee is steaming hot and the aroma is comforting.

He takes his tray to the closest table and tries to slowly eat as much as he can. His mind is still foggy, but he knows he's going to have to find a way to fix this. Find a way to contact Stark Industries and let them know what happened.

“JARVIS, is there a communications console somewhere on this ship?” he asks.

“There is a communications console located near the ship’s center,” JARVIS informs him pleasantly.

“And it can send calls and messages back to Earth?” He’s learned his lesson about making sure he has all the information before he goes rushing off.

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“Alright.” Chewing thoughtfully on his toast, he feels slightly better. The crust is crunchy, but the middle is a little chewy. There is a liberal amount of butter on top that adds a burst of flavour with each bite.

The physical sensations of eating and tasting ground him. He can solve this. Contact Stark Industries, find out how to put himself back in cryostasis, wake up in another ninety years. Maybe even meet Captain Rogers when they arrive at their destination. No problem.

* * *

The communications console is a clear booth located near the ship’s city center. As he steps inside, he is greeted with a large soft chair facing a medium-sized monitor and a touch-screen keyboard. Sliding into the chair, he wipes sweaty palms on his pants. The seat below him is exceedingly comfortable.

“Okay,” he says aloud. “How do I contact Earth using this?”

“I can start a video message for you. Who would you like to contact?”

That question requires some deeper thinking. “Is there some sort of emergency customer service line for Stark Industries?”

“Yes, Sergeant. I can connect you with our emergency inquiry line. Your message will be forwarded to a representative.”

Heavy exhale of breath. “Good. Let's do that.”

JARVIS brings up a video call screen. It loads, and a little green phone button appears below the face staring back at him.

“When you are ready, Sergeant.”

He presses record.

It takes a brief moment to outline his problem. Stranded on the ship, his pod opening nine decades too early. The rest of the passengers and crew, still asleep. His mild memory issues, his churning nausea. When he is done, he ends the recording.

“How was that?” he asks JARVIS.

“Very good, Sergeant.”

The screen blinks a little loading symbol. There is an animation of his message being transmitted from ship to home planet, along with a frankly ridiculous charge for the call. Whatever. He'd complain later about that. He's sure Stark Industries will be falling all over themselves to make it up to him once they get his message.

“How long until I get a response?”

JARVIS delivers the blow in the same measured tone it had used when he'd first woken up, “Estimated response time is thirty-two years.”

“What the _fuck_,” he says, because there is nothing else to say in response to this car crash of an answer. “How is it _thirty-two_ _years_ for a callback?”

JARVIS goes on to outline the process of transmitting a message through light years worth of space, but he isn't listening anymore. There's a hollowness inside of him, like his organs have dropped out, like he is a wooden casket without a body.

Wait thirty-two years for an answer and then what? That would be three decades of his life wasted, and that was only if they had a solution to give him. Thirty-two years of floating listlessly through space alone.

“Fuck you,” he spits out to the empty booth, because it helps him feel less afraid. JARVIS goes quiet. “_Fuck space travel_.”

He knocks over the chair out of spite and spends the rest of the day wandering around the ship, screaming his voice raw about the unfairness of it all, pushing the heels of his palms against his eyes and trying to quell the sick twists of disorientation deep in his gut. Tries to break things, tries to feel _ something_, anything, even if it has to be physical pain.

Thirty-two years. He can’t imagine that. He can’t wrap his head around the idea of spending thirty-two years alone in space. The isolation, the madness. The loneliness.

He forgets where he is, loses himself in the labyrinth of the ship until he exhausts himself. He doesn’t remember finding his room again and passing out on top of the bedding.

Sleep comes fitfully full of exhaustion and devoid of dreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you subscribe to this story, please be advised that more important chapters will have chapter summaries, and very short ones will not. that way you can let them pile up if that's the sort of thing you like to do.


	3. DAY TWO.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw alcohol for this chapter

Although physically he feels better, the crushing feeling from yesterday's discovery still festers in his gut, heavy and raw like a rusted iron weight. The bed sheets are scratchy against his sensitive skin. He only eats because he has to; he feels dizzy otherwise. Waking from cryostasis has left him slightly malnourished and weak.

In the mess hall, he lies down on top of a clean white table and stares blankly at the ceiling. He asks JARVIS about how to fix his pod. He listens to the toneless voice drone on.

Apparently these pods _never_ malfunction, there is _no_ _protocol_ for broken pods, and he is just the _sad unlucky bastard_ who is going to have to live for thirty-two years with that.

Lunch is boring, mainly because you have to be some sort of gold-star member to order anything that isn't a regular sandwich or pasta dish. Which is patently elitist and stupid, but still better than thirty-two years of meatloaf.

The number won't quit pounding away in his head: thirty-two, thirty-two, thirty-two. _ He's _ not even thirty-two yet, how can he possibly imagine spending that much time on this shitty ship? Suddenly and savagely he wants to go do something reckless, anything to distract himself from this new inevitability of oblivion.

A quick query to the AI reveals there is a bar on board. And what do you know, JARVIS the Bartender is there, offering him all kind of hard liquor until he feels like he's going to puke. He barely has two shots before he stumbles to the bathrooms.

He spends the evening clammy and trembling, afraid to close his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> leave a comment please! :)


	4. DAY THREE.

Full of pathetic self pity and feeling like shit.

He spends most of the day shaking off his two-shot hangover in the pod room while complaining bitterly to JARVIS and the good Captain. Time passes slowly, like the seconds are minutes and the minutes are hours.

He drinks lots of water and pointedly avoids the city center. Denial is the first stage, he thinks to himself wryly. Maybe if he closes his eyes long enough, he’ll wake back up inside the cryo pod. Maybe if he holds his body still long enough, he can trick himself into thinking this is all a terrible nightmare.

JARVIS keeps him company, although a disembodied voice can only really provide so much comfort. He can ask JARVIS questions on practically anything and get an answer. He can ask JARVIS to narrate the entire collected works of Shakespeare, if he wants to.

Despite the fascinating conversation and wonderful company, he goes to bed early like an old man.


	5. DAY SIX.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Stark Industries logo whirls from the corner of the screen, round and round and round. Endlessly moving, just like the ship around him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> updated the fic tags, please take note!

A few days pass, and then one morning he is finally headache-free when he wakes up. This is enough to spur him into action. He feels more energized, like he can really start to get things done instead of just moping about like an idiot.

So he’s back to being sensible. Plans include: studying the manual, keeping more food down, and avoiding alcohol. He eventually finds a general storage room while looking for things that might be useful. The storage room doesn’t have much that he needs. Extra bedding and towels, a first-aid kit. There are, however, some mechanical supplies that he lugs back to his room. He can try to break down the door to the control room.

He also discovers a manual for the cryo pods, but it's as long as a dictionary and reads like a history text— confusingly wordy and biased towards people who've actually studied the subject.

Still, maybe he can piece together enough knowledge to take the pod apart and figure out how to fix it. He's certainly got enough time to try it. After a quick flip through the pages, he bookmarks a few pages that look promising and resolves to read through it later.

The physical exertion of moving around the ship is exhausting, though, so he spends the rest of the day floating aimlessly around in the giant swimming pool on the left side of the city center. The water is a cool balm on his skin, like all his worries are being leached away into the pool.

He thinks about Captain Rogers, and wonders if the Captain was a swimmer before he got himself frozen in time. Maybe he was a naval officer. He could imagine that, he could picture Steve Rogers wearing a dashing naval officer’s uniform. Windswept hair and golden, sun-kissed skin. Real movie star type stuff.

Actually, that reminds him of something. It reminds him of another type of video recording.

“JARVIS?” he asks.

“Yes, Sergeant?” It’s a little unnerving how its voice is at a natural volume, like JARVIS is standing right next to him.

“Before I got on this ship,” he begins hesitantly. “I remember storing my things into a capsule.”

“All belongings are stored on the second lowest level of the STARK VIII.”

JARVIS to guides him to the storage sector. There are endless rows of shiny metal storage units, each labelled with a unique passenger number. He nearly gets excited, only to find that everything has a stupid time lock on it. Supposedly this was to prevent 'theft’, although how anyone was supposed to steal anything when all the passengers were sleeping was beyond him. None of the storage units will open until four months before landing.

There is, however, a database of video recordings taken before the ship launched. The files are organized by passenger name, and are all publicly accessible.

His insides twist themselves into knots. A few facts float themselves back into his memory. All passengers had the option of filming a few short clips prior to boarding the ship. A sort of testimonial type thing, a fond farewell to the lives they were leaving behind. He knows that his own videos exist on this database. Everything is merely a voice command away from being played.

He vaguely notices his right hand is shaking. He stares at it, trying to still the movement with the force of his gaze. His left hand, unnaturally still, is clutching the sleek metal tablet he’d brought with him. It is hard to reconnect the scrambled pieces of his brain, to will the body to function correctly.

His decision isn’t fully conscious. He syncs the tablet to the database. He finds the videos he wants. He loads them onto the tablet. The Stark Industries logo whirls from the corner of the screen, round and round and round. Endlessly moving, just like the ship around him.

A delicate chime signals that his downloads are complete. He disconnects the tablet and goes back to his room, his steps mechanical, his expression eerily calm.

He props the tablet up on the desk and sits down in the bright red desk chair. He swipes a finger across the screen until he gets to the screen he wants. The little thumbnail of his face is unnerving, but he is no longer deterred; he is numb. He hits play and lets the scene unfold.

Watching his own face, hearing his own voice— it's surreal. Doubly so because he can't remember having filmed these. He’s watching a stranger with his face, his mannerisms.

His ghost doesn't talk about why space travel, about why the STARK VIII. The video is short and doesn’t talk about anything at all, really. There are some mentions of saying a 'final’ goodbye. There is a painfully poignant pause in which he thinks his image is about to cry. But no tears emerge, leaving him to wonder why he finally decided to get on this damn ship to begin with. Surely the lure of a new planet, exciting as it was, wasn't that strong.

There's silence for a good five minutes of video, in which he sees himself visibly deep in thought, trying to string together enough words to be coherent. Then he looks up, smiling wistfully at the camera. “But... a new life, a fresh start. That's what I want, isn't it? So if I'm watching this now, over a hundred years from now or whatever, I hope it's as great as I'm hoping for.”

So that was apparently his answer. A ‘fresh start’, whatever that was supposed to mean. He wants to be angry at this stupid, naive version of himself. His past self is the reason he’s stuck on this fucking ship with no chance at a future.

But the goddamn hope in his own eyes, in that last second of the video… he can’t quite bring himself to hate that part of him. It’s a version of him that he wishes, now more than anything, was real.

His past self had only recorded one video. He closes the current video tab and goes back to the main video menu. More thumbnails look out at him from the screen. There were some people who had recorded multiple videos, and Steve Rogers was one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments are very much appreciated!


	6. INTERLUDE ONE: BUCKY BARNES

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You need me like I need you, Stevie, in all of the worst ways.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> really hoping i didn’t shoot myself in the foot with this update bc i’m still dicking around with the plot details as i write this oops

/START RECORDING…

...

[Bucky Barnes is seated on a metal chair, a plain grey wall behind him. He looks tired; there are dark circles under his eyes. Occasionally he stops and rolls his left shoulder, as though it is bothering him.]

“So apparently I’m supposed to record my thoughts and feelings before I get on this ship.” [He sighs.] “I don’t really want to talk about that. Any of that.”

[Bucky drops his gaze away from the camera.]

“People always ask me to talk about things. Say it’ll help me, make me feel better. ‘Talk about it with someone’, they say. ‘Talk with someone you’re comfortable with.’” [He barks a short laugh.] “Hell, I’m not even comfortable with myself.”

[A pause. Thoughts are slowly starting to pull themselves together.]

“I guess that’s what this is though, isn’t it? Me talking to a camera. Someone who’s not going to judge me for what I have to say or what I’ve done.” [Bucky closes his eyes, slumps his shoulders.] “What I’ve done.”

“There’s a lot of things I’ve done. But that’s besides the point. This ship, this journey? This entire crazy idea. Going to a new fucking planet that’s a hundred and twenty years away from Earth.” [A hand waves around to encompass the whole idea in a mocking motion.] “That’s going to fix everything. Or it’s at least going to fix _ something _.”

“At least, that’s what you seem to think.” [Bucky makes eye contact with the camera again.] “That there’s something to be fixed. I know you don’t say it, you’d never say it, you’d say I’m wrong, but it’s true. Decades later and it’s still true. Time and distance don’t change that. I don’t change. I haven’t changed since HYDRA.”

[He stops, expression pained.]

“I’ve tried. Believe me, I’ve fucking tried. But you know, don’t you? You know because you’re the same way. We don’t change and we don’t age and we don’t get any better. I wake up to the same nightmares for months. I see the same dying faces burned into my mind for years. I hold this guilt inside of me; I’ve carried it for decades. I’m wired for this. They built me for this. I can’t be fixed.”

[His hands clench on the armrests of the chair.]

“You’re the same way. You wake up in a cold sweat. You get up and pace the room and check the locks three times, but you act like nothing’s the matter. You bite your lip and jump at loud noises. Your hands shake and you don’t realize it right away. I do the same fucking things. You look at me sometimes and it fucking hurts, that expression on your face. _ We’re trying to fix things that can’t be fixed._”

[The words are coming in a rush, now.]

“And it’s so much all the time, and it’s so goddamn tiring. I want it to be over. I want to close my eyes and never wake up again.”

“But I can’t do that to you. I can’t leave you behind like that. I told you once, I promised you—”

[His throat catches, and it takes a moment before he can speak again.] 

“I promised you that I was never going to leave you behind.”

[He goes quiet for a long time. The left armrest is now warped beneath his hand. Bucky takes several deep breaths.]

“I hate this. And I want to hate you for never giving up, but I can’t. I couldn’t even if I tried. Because here we are, about to take this fucking hundred and twenty year long trip to a planet named after Tony fucking Stark. Because even long after the world has forgotten about us, I’m still ready to follow you to the end of the galaxy and beyond, apparently. ”

“And isn’t that a laugh. That you’re doing this for me, and I’m doing this because I know you’re only doing it for me. You’ve always been at your best when there’s someone to help, Steve. A little guy to fight for. I know that better than anyone, better than you know yourself.”

“So I’ll let you try to fix me if that’s what you need. I’ll let you keep the fantasy where someday we’ll both be alright, because I’m a selfish bastard who needs you by my side. Because as long as you’re here, that’s where I know I need to be.”

[The corner of his mouth twists upwards.]

“It’s always you and me, in the end. I’d know you in a thousand different lifetimes, if I believed in the afterlife. I know you’d find me no matter what, because you’re the most stubborn punk I’ve ever met. But maybe we’ll live forever, who knows. Maybe we’ll stay this way, two small planets orbiting around each other, no sun in sight, unable to die, unable to break free.”

“I’d never say any of this if I thought there was a chance in hell of you seeing it. God knows I’ve been cynical for years now, and I don’t plan on stopping any time soon. You’re the only good thing in my life that I can stomach, Rogers. I’ll stay breathing for you, even if I think it’s pointless. I’ll let you coddle me, and I’ll try not to snap at you for it too many times. Hell, I’ll live on Mars if it makes you happy.”

“You need me like I need you, Stevie, in all of the worst ways.”

[He’s really smiling now. A soft, gentle smile.]

“You know what? Maybe you’re rubbing off on me a bit in our old age, ‘cause some days I’m still hoping the universe will look down on us and smile.”

[Minutes pass.]

[Bucky doesn’t move.]

“Hmph.” [He sighs quietly.] “Time to dispose of the evidence, I guess.”

[Bucky gets up. He walks forward and looks at the screen, reaching out to touch it. He is muttering under his breath as he swipes through options.]

...

/DELETE RECORDING?…

…

\YES…

...

/RECORDING DELETED...


	7. DAY EIGHTEEN.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is eh, so i’ll probably edit it a bit later. content will be the same.
> 
> also i published a second chapter by mistake so... ignore that please :( i deleted it now

The manual is stupid. He hates it. He leaves it in the pod room and tries to forget about its existence.

He tries to use the power tools to break down the door to the control room. Doesn't work. It’s hard to resist the urge to simply smash everything into the wall, to take apart the tools until they’re in pieces. He wants to blow up something, anything. He has the urge to crush and burn and destroy. But there’s still some restraint left in him, some line he cannot cross.

He’s afraid of what will happen if he doesn’t do something to stop the urge. He knows he has more reasons to be afraid of himself than anything else in this spaceship.

The city center has a recreational gym, so he starts going there. Shooting hoops is sort of fun, and lifting weights certainly takes his mind off other things.

He finds that the repetitive motions are calming, even if he starts to zone out after a while. He can work himself into exhaustion watching the ball bounce against the wall again and again, smacking the rubber with his hand.

When afternoon rolls around, he goes back to the bar to can hang with JARVIS in robot form instead of talking to its disembodied voice all day. He nurses a large glass of cold water and munches on peanuts as he talks.

Bartender JARVIS actually does have some kind of personality programmed into him. He can hold some pretty neat conversations. If you don’t look at JARVIS too long, if you don’t think about what he says too much, you can almost pretend that he’s a real person.

For the evening’s entertainment he watches a documentary on penguins at the theatre. He throws popcorn at the screen when the penguins get into fights. He watches the little vacuum bots skitter across the floor to suck the bits up. It feels almost normal.

Almost, almost, almost.

The documentary ends, and he feels strangely guilty. The manual has been taunting him from where he left it in the pod room.

So he goes back to fetch it, and winds up staying there to try and read it. He's not giving up, not by a long shot. He's just tired; he's needed to adjust to a lot these past few weeks. Having the excuse makes him feel better; he clutches the idea to himself like a lifeline.

He can do a little bit of work every day, he decides. There's certainly no rush.

He hopes that when he finally passes out in his bed there will be no colourful dreams to haunt him in the morning. But when sleep finally comes, the dreams are there.


	8. DAY THIRTY-SEVEN.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every so often he pulls up the video menu on his tablet. He looks at the videos, at the thumbnails of Steve’s face.

He has been hard at work in the pod room. The left side of his pod has been mostly dismantled, and he is beginning to get an understanding of what's inside. What he still doesn't know is how to restart the cryostasis cycle. The book doesn't say how, and there isn't even a chapter on it. He's very hesitant to gamble his life on his ability to draw the correct conclusions.

To pass the time, he loads some e-books onto his tablet from the ship's database. He sits in his open pod, cross-legged, reading the funny bits out loud. Captain Rogers doesn't laugh, but that's alright. He can imagine the little blips of the metronome as conversation.

Sometimes he thinks he can even imagine a response, but he knows that's just the overactive imagination of a very lonely man. Besides, comedy tends to have a universal reaction: laughter. He would bet good money that Captain Rogers has a rich, handsome laugh to match his face.

Besides, one-sided conversations aren't that bad.

“Had eggs for breakfast,” he says to Steve. “Scrambled this time. Easier to keep down, somehow. But I bet a guy like you eats eggs all the time,”

and

“You would not _ believe _ the absolute bullshit that Stacey bought on that stupid soap opera. She pisses me off. I can't wait till he dumps her for that other girl. Or his roommate, Jensen. That would be even better, cause he's hotter,”

and

“Your abs are like washboards. Jesus Christ.”

* * *

Every so often he pulls up the video menu on his tablet. He looks at the videos, at the thumbnails of Steve’s face.

Sure, they were publicly available videos. But it still seemed like an awful breach of privacy to play them, like watching them would be a disservice to the idea of Steve he had in his head. And he certainly had a lot of ideas about Steve.

The fact that most of these ideas revolved around _ him _ and Steve wasn’t extremely relevant. Steve just had one of those wholesome apple-pie faces; he was someone you could take home to your parents. He was safe and sturdy, and safe and sturdy sounded pretty damn good right about now. Steve was probably a great boyfriend.

But the videos remain unwatched, and Steve remains but an imagined personality, a perfect man to match the perfect body still frozen in cryostasis.

* * *

“Hey JARVIS,” he says, sliding onto a bar stool. “Long time no see.”

“Sergeant Barnes,” JARVIS greets him, whirling over. “What can I get for you today?”

“Just a club soda.”

JARVIS fills a glass and slides it over to him in a smooth motion. “And how are we feeling?”

“Pretty good. At least when I can get some sleep.” To punctuate this statement, he yawns loudly.

“Nightmares again?” JARVIS asks sympathetically.

He nods, grimacing. “Same old, same old. Can never remember them properly when I wake up.”

“Perhaps they’re trying to tell you something,” JARVIS says.

He takes a drink of his soda. “Can’t imagine what.” Hard to decipher nightmares when you didn’t know what they were. There was only ever the awful, horrible feeling that something was very, very wrong. He would lie in his bed, limbs trembling, trying not to sob. If he woke up, it was unlikely he would get back to bed.

“How’s the Captain?” JARVIS changes the subject.

“Still frozen.” Like the ice cubes in his drink.

“Have you talked to him?”

He laughs, “Not really. Talking at him, more like. But he’s still good company. Handsome bastard.” He almost wishes Steve was awake with him.

JARVIS raises an eyebrow. “Perhaps you should give listening a try.”

He thinks of the videos again. “Maybe soon. But not yet, I don’t think. Doesn’t feel right yet.”

* * *

He tries to pass the evening with the ship's entertainment consoles, but his mind is restless and he can't pay attention long enough to enjoy it. So he goes back to Steve, back to curling up in his cushioned pod and listening to the soft sounds of the cryostasis machines around him.

“Bet you have a better reason for being here than I do,” he says to Steve. “Bet you’ve got your life together.”

Steve’s heart blips a soft beat in response.

“Probably talked all about it in those videos of yours.” He closes his eyes, pictures Steve Rogers in a fancy office with a leather-backed chair, recording his pre-space trip videos.

In this imagined scenario, Steve is a very animated speaker. He makes lots of hand gestures and plenty of facial expressions—he’s the epitome of the perfect public speaker. Steve wears nice collared shirts that are tight around the bicep. Steve smiles warmly at the camera, like he’s talking to a close friend, or a lover.

  
He never quite gets close enough to placing himself in the same room as imaginary Steve. He’s not that <strike>desperate</strike> brave yet.


	9. DAY SIXTY-TWO.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for a thought about suicide at the end of the chapter. if you want to, this chapter is skippable in terms of major plot content.

Sleeping has continued to prove problematic. Now that the exhaustion from cryo had been slept off, he could only catch a few hours before he woke from nightmares. At least, he assumed they were nightmares from the way he woke: his heartbeat erratic and his body drenched in cold sweat. He frequently gets flashes of memory he doesn't recall, and most of the time he can't even recall the flashes after seeing them.

He had poured his energy into deciphering the manual, only to now realize that it might not have the answers he was looking for.

There is no clear way to restart a pod by yourself. In fact, the manual outlines (very vaguely) the correct procedure to put someone _ into _ a pod, which is a process that is meant to be carried out by a team of three or more professional individuals. Seeing the diagrams makes him queasy, even though the images are pretty clinical.

The section after that describes how to wake someone up from cryo. If he lingers on those pages a little longer than he should, well, it’s only out of curiosity. He’d never actually do it.

But he does feel like he is losing his mind, and the ship is beginning to feel like a prison.

He forgets to eat, and he loses track of the days until he thinks to ask JARVIS how long he's been out of cryostasis.

“Sixty-two days, Sergeant Barnes.”

Over two months. He had never had a weak stomach before, but now he feels like he wants to throw up all the time. He gets twitchy and anxious, jumping at shadows in the corridors.

He’d taken to carrying a pocket knife with him, raided from an emergency kit. He flips it around in his hand a lot. The weight is grounding, almost comforting.

Day sixty-two is spent swimming laps at the pool, wondering how much water it takes to drown.


	10. DAY ——

Downhill slide from day sixty two.

He's floating on his back in the swimming pool, watching the live projection of stars across the ceiling.

The routine is the same every day: wake up past 'noon’, eat enough to keep himself upright, lounge around the ship until it's late enough to go back to bed. His current location of the pool means it's a fairly good day.

Captain Rogers's video recordings sit next to his pod, waiting for the last bit of his integrity to shatter along with everything else.

He likes Steve a lot. Steve's a good listener, and the sound of his heartbeat is calming. Even the idea of listening to those videos feels like a betrayal of all the nights he's spent slumped against the pods, talking away his loneliness until his voice fades to nothing. Steve has unknowingly kept him company ever since the beginning.

The days wear on, relentless and unyielding.

Eventually, he can’t take it anymore. He knows he needs something that isn’t his own head playing tricks on him. It’s been days or weeks since he told himself he shouldn’t, told himself he wouldn’t, and part of him is ashamed at how easily he has caved. But the videos are there, and he will be long dead before Steve Rogers even knows he’s seen them.

So one dark night, one terrible night where the only thing stopping him from doing the unthinkable is the idea of this one small comfort, he tells JARVIS to queue up the videos onto his tablet. And then he’s crawling into bed, clutching at the device like a lifeline, curled on his side as Steve’s face flickers to life before his very eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *whispers* shit just got real


	11. INTERLUDE TWO: STEVE ROGERS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Steve Rogers is seated on a black leather chair with a solid white wall behind him. He visibly forces a smile onto his face as the camera starts.]

/START RECORDING...

...

\PLAYING...

[Steve Rogers is seated on a black leather chair with a solid white wall behind him. He visibly forces a smile onto his face as the camera starts.]

“Uh, hi. I'm not exactly sure what I'm supposed to say here. But Tony said it was a good idea. Said I should act like I was talking with an old friend? Anyways.”

[He shifts on his chair for a moment, looking pensive. The false smile falters.]

“I’m not even sure if this is supposed to be for me.”

[Steve looks past the camera, ostensibly where someone would be standing if they were filming. He seems disappointed.]

“I guess I can do this like I’m talking to someone. Sure will feel less like I’m talking to myself.”

“So. I’m on a 100 year trip into space.”

[Visibly, he inhales deeply. His shoulders relax slightly.]

“A hundred years frozen. Tony keeps joking that I’m going to be the world’s oldest living man. Which I suppose I am. I was the last surviving veteran of World War One. A living piece of history.”

[A bitter curl to the corner of his mouth. A bitter twist to the words being spoken.]

“Maybe I can start by telling you that. The history. The years I slept for and the years when I was awake. The thing I remember most after I woke in the twentieth century was the adjusting. Everyone tells you that you’ll adjust easy. They tell you that you’ll get used to it. And you do.” [He chuckles.] “You get used to it a little too fast, sometimes. You start to get complacent with some things, and the rest just make you real angry.”

“And believe me, I was angry. There was a lot of ‘why me?’ and thinking about the unfairness of it all. I’d— I’d had so much taken away. I’d given myself to the war, and that was supposed to be the end of it. I was ready for that, for the end. And then I had the whole goddamn fuckin’ century pulled out from under me. I kept asking myself: what else was there for me to do? Why hadn’t it been enough?”

“You always said I carried the weight of the world on my shoulders. I guess for once in my life I wanted to let that go. But death still failed me. Then I started thinking that maybe the things I couldn’t live without were the ones that were really haunting me.”

/PAUSE RECORDING...


	12. DAY ——

The mirror looks back at him. Gaunt, unshaven. Dark circles under dark eyes. He thinks to himself this is how monsters are born—out of isolation, out of suffering.

He thinks about thirty-two years. About how time is only as long as it feels. He thinks in circles, and he thinks  _ selfish selfish selfish _ things.

He wanders aimlessly around the ship: prowling, pacing. If he stops for too long he gets drawn back to the pod room, to the manual.

Captain Rogers is a good man. That much was clear from the videos he had recorded. A literal goddamn superhero. A member of the Avengers. Steve talked at length for hours, so candidly that it was shocking. It sounded like a story. It should have been a story. But Steve was real, so real it hurt, and the things he said were filled with such grief, such emotion, that they had to be true. 

Steve talked about waking up in the 20th century, about joining the Avengers initiative. He talked about saving lives and fighting aliens. He talked about being Captain America.

There were times, though, where Steve grew pensive and quiet. Like there was something he still couldn’t talk about, even to the imaginary person behind the camera that he seemed to trust so much. It was a humbling touch of humanity to someone who, by all means, could only be likened to a god.

Steve probably wants to see the universe. He deserves to.

It'd take a monster to steal that away from him.

* * *

  
The manual lies open on the pod next to Steven Grant Rogers. The page details how to manually open a cryostasis pod.

He doesn't look at it, but it's there. He's read the page a dozen times before. He could do it.

* * *

He never asks JARVIS how long it’s been, but he knows it’s a long time. He’s long past the snapping point; all that remains is a strange, cold resolve. He will, in all likelihood, die on this ship. It will not be from starvation or dehydration or illness.

He hates himself. He hates his self-hatred. He can’t stand to think of what will become of him, alone and isolated on this ship with no other human beings for company. There is nothing left but destruction. The only question is whether he will be the only casualty.

_ He hates he hates he hates he hates he hates— _

The words rattle around in his head like shell casings.

* * *

/START RECORDING…

…

\FAST FORWARDING…

…

/PLAYING…

[Steve Rogers is seated on a black leather chair with a solid white wall behind him. He is in the middle of speaking.]

“Tony says this for the best. And maybe he’s right. I think he could be. I guess it really doesn’t matter one way or the other anymore.”

“I ask myself all the time. Is this better or is it easier? Sometimes it feels like running away. You know I hate that. Sam once said that anyone who’s known me for more than five minutes knows that. I spent my whole life running at things. You spent your whole life chasing me while I did it.”

[Steve pauses, almost fondly. He looks down at his hands for a long moment, then back towards the camera.]

“Well. I’m with you, now. Til’ the end of the line."


	13. DAY ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY.

** _Bucky Barnes_ **

He watches the cool blade of the razor as it disappears into the shaving cream on his face. Smooth strokes glide across the surface of his skin as the hair and foam fall into the sink below. One movement at a time, until all of the white is washed away, leaving clean skin behind.

He runs a hand over his cheeks, his jaw, his neck. It feels softer than he remembers. His face looks surprised, like he’d been hiding away for a while. He looks and feels human again. Like a real person, instead of an imitation of one.

It’s good, he tells himself. It’s a good thing.

* * *

  
** _Steve Rogers_ **

Fog fills behind the glass like a smoke screen, blurring out the facial features. The pod opens with a dramatic  _whoosh_, the cover lifting upwards at a 90 degree angle, revealing the man within. A robotic voice echoes softly outwards from the chamber.

“Welcome, Steven Rogers. Please be advised that it is perfectly normal to experience discomfort...”

And Steve Rogers sits up, disoriented and exhausted.


	14. DAY ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY ONE.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve steps out of the shower and towels off. He can see himself reflected in the mirror, his silhouette visible out of the corner of his eye. Unchanged by the turn of yet another century, he thinks to himself. Forever frozen as Captain America, the man out of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw vomiting for this chapter

** _Steve Rogers_ **

Steve wakes up at nine in the morning with a terrible headache. His sheets are twisted and soaked in sweat. It takes a while to untangle himself from the bedding and stumble his way into the shower.

He turns the water up until it’s nearly scalding, the heat working its way into his muscles and working out the tension there. With his eyes closed, he can feel the streams of water on his face dripping down onto his chest. Soothing, calming.

Steve takes a deep breath, then lets it out in a measured fashion.

The minutes tick by as he stands there, slowly soaking himself to the bone. Waiting for the heat to wake him up, to make him feel alive again. He runs a damp hand through his hair, combing out the thick strands.

Eventually, he shuts the water off. He’s still breathing heavily, sitting on the edge of a downward spiral.

Steve steps out of the shower and towels off. He can see himself reflected in the mirror, his silhouette visible out of the corner of his eye. Unchanged by the turn of yet another century, he thinks to himself. Forever frozen as Captain America, the man out of time.

History had not been as kind to him as the years have been to his appearance.

Scrubbing a tired hand across his face, Steve sheds his towel in favour of a plain button down and tan trousers. Time to face the day.

* * *

Everything is… empty. Which is not to say that there's _nothing_. There are tables and screens and even little cleaning bots. But there are no people in the spaceship.

Steve can practically feel his paranoia begin to tick upwards, he can sense the prickle against the back of his neck that warns him of danger, his natural survival instinct. Like he’s being watched.

Wandering through the city center, Steve surveys his surroundings, taking slow steps as he maps out the area in his mind’s eye.

“JARVIS?” he asks, in a voice not much louder than his normal tone.

“Yes, Captain?”

He almost doesn’t want to ask, because he’s sure he won’t like the answer. “Where are the other passengers?”

“A majority of the passengers of STARK VIII are currently located on pod decks one through seven.”

Steve goes silent for an entire minute. He is counting the seconds between his breaths, feeling the rise and fall of his chest.

“And the crew?” he asks, when his words are steady and his throat doesn’t threaten to swell shut.

“The crew members of STARK VIII are located in the ship's control room.”

His eyes close without conscious effort. “Are they still in the pods?”

“Yes, Captain.”

He is so tired. But he has to ask, he needs to know. “How far are we from the planet, JARVIS?”

“Estimated arrival at current speeds is eighty-nine years, thirty-three weeks, six days and five hours, Captain.”

Steve sits down on the floor and stays there for a long, long time.

* * *

** _Bucky Barnes_ **

He can see Rogers on the screen, sitting in the center of the city square. Guilt is gnawing at his chest, eating away at what remains of his insides. But he’s so fucking relieved, so glad to see another real person. The dichotomy between the two feelings is jarring.

The word ‘betrayal’ floats around him, a low, accusing whisper in his ear. He’s betrayed Steve.

Is it possible to betray people you don’t know? He supposes it could happen. That you could break those unwritten, unspoken rules. That you could commit acts so horrific that they had been previously unthought of. That you could steal time itself from someone without their consent.

Nausea churns. He forces it down, tucks it away. He will ignore it in the pursuit of his greater goal.

He stands on shaking legs. It takes a moment to stop the tremors. And then, and _ then_, he leaves the room, his hands not quite steady as he scans his key card, and goes forth to finally meet the product of his horrific decisions.

* * *

He doesn’t have a real plan other than ‘wander around until Steve shows up’. Sure, he has a general idea of where Steve had been. He had been in the middle of the city square. He would have moved since then, right?

But Steve is either very good at hiding, or he just happens to have a lot of sheer dumb luck.

Somehow, he finds his way back to where it all began: the pod room. His pod room. Their pod room. And Steve is there, of course he’s there, crouched down next to his pod with an endearing look of consternation on his perfect face.

Gravity crashes down on him as he watches Steve. The sudden, violent collision of guilt and nausea sends him reeling back through the doorway. Steve hears him, hears him panicking, but he is running away, running far away from Steve and the pod room and the responsibility for his actions.

He runs fast, faster than he remembers running ever since he woke up. He legs propel him across walkways and back towards the maze of the city center. Steve is keeping pace easily behind him, his own strides swift and focused, because he’s Captain fucking America. Steve is faster and in better shape; the only reason he hasn’t caught up is because he doesn’t know the layout of the ship as well.

Eventually, the gap begins to close. He’s sweating, and he can hear Steve yelling for him to slow down, to wait. He wants to keep running forever, but he knows that’s not an option. He’s halfway to the planetarium when Steve is finally close enough to corner him.

But he doesn’t corner him. He doesn’t even move. Captain Steve Rogers stops in the middle of the hallway and shouts—“_Bucky? _”

The name stops him. Stops him dead in his tracks. (Inhale.) He turns around, looks at Steve. Steve’s wide, innocent blue eyes. (Exhale.) His brow furrows. He doesn’t understand, doesn’t recognize—

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

Time freezes. It is impossible to tell who is more reluctant to move now.

And then Steve falls to his knees as if he’s been gutted, absolutely horrified. He’s seeing a ghost.

* * *

He ran away, after that. After that terrible expression had crossed Steve’s face.

Stumbling into his room, fumbling to the bathroom, collapsing against the porcelain and heaving the contents of his stomach into the waters below.

His heart was bludgeoning its way out of his chest, beat by beat. He coughed and coughed until his lungs went dry. His fingers scrambled against the cool surface, to hold on to something as he fell apart.

James Buchanan Barnes closes his eyes and stays there for a long, long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yooooo here i am with another update. i don't know exactly how long it will be until the next one, mostly because i'm struggling with the direction i want to take this in!! but i hope you all enjoyed this chapter despite how angsty it is.

**Author's Note:**

> please leave a comment!! it really helps encourage me to write more and write faster :)


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